The gathering of hop vines and their transfer to a picking machine has been up to now mostly performed by a manual tearing off of vines, storage on simple conveying means, transfer on simple transfer means and by a manual suspending in order to be taken over directly from said transport means by a feeding track of a processing line. This kind of gathering is rather demanding of manual labor. Moreover, this labor is very frequently performed under adverse conditions, is physically demanding, particularly if the hop vines are torn off in the course of unfavorable weather, and requires a monotonous manual, physically demanding suspension of vines to be fed to a stationary processing line.
Other drawbacks of the known method are: the relatively long idle time intervals of conveying means, the necessity of changing of driving means (of tractors) and the increased danger of working accidents of attendants engaged therewith.
A method for cutting and tearing off of hop vines using an arrangement supported on a tractor is also known, where the hop vines are automatically cut off and torn off and thereafter are placed on some conveying means. The hop vines are, however, stored on the conveying means in a rather maladjusted manner. In case of application of a similar method and apparatus, the work required from the attendants caring for conveying means is relatively reduced, but the demanding manual labor in connection with the suspension of vines which have to be fed to a stationary processing line is not eliminated.
In apparatus using simple conveying means, the drawbacks due to idle time intervals of those conveying means prevail and the increased risk in connection with the changing of conveying means is also not eliminated.
Methods and apparatuses comprising conveying means with a discharge conveyer are also known where the hop vine can be mechanically removed from the conveying means so that the idle time interval of similar combined conveying means on the working site where the suspending of hop vines takes place is reduced.
A drawback of similar solutions is, however, the relatively increased damage of the product in the course of transfer and further drawbacks originating therefrom.
In case of a manual feeding of vines to the processing line, the vines are individually suspended on simple devices which transfer and feed the vines directly to a picking machine without the possibility of any accumulation. The efficiency of similar lines depends directly on the instantaneous efficiency of attendants at the working site where the suspension is performed. At more efficient processing lines the vines are individually suspended at an automatic conveying track providing also a certain possibility of accumulation of vines prior to being processed in the proper picking machine. Thus, the efficiency and smoothness of work of the whole processing line are increased. A drawback of known arrangements of similar tracks is, however, a substantially higher requirement in manufacturing and a limited possibility of accumulation of vines in front of the picking machine.
A common drawback of all actually known methods and apparatuses is the high requirement of human labor for suspension of vines prior to being supplied to the processing line and the dependence of the working time required for suspension on the quality and the conditions of the gathered product and simultaneously also the dependence on the quality of the manual or automatic work in connection with introduction of vines to the conveying means.